Lightweighting of packaging grades is a key focus area for paper and board companies, impacting the overall sustainability, cost-efficiency and quality performance. As a long-term partner to the industry, Kemira is investing heavily into R&D and manufacturing capabilities to help customers achieve their lightweighting initiatives with best-performing chemistries.
As part of these lightweighting product development efforts, Kemira has on March 23, 2021 been granted a new patent in the United States, relating to the application of highly structured and effective silica sols together with glyoxalated polyacrylamide (GPAM) strength technologies in recycled fiber containing board grades. The technology will benefit customers in terms of lower fiber costs and higher end-product performance. In addition to this new US patent, there are additional patents in the same product family issued in other countries, including Canada.
“A considerable amount of time, effort and resources have gone into developing this technologically leading approach for recycled liner machines. We are proud of the value this technology brings to our customers. The approach is unique: it provides higher quality linerboard and also significantly improves paper machine stability and runnability. Lightweighting can produce huge benefits for paper and board makers in packaging performance, fiber optimization, and energy consumption. It is an excellent example of doing more with less,” says Michael Wallace, marketing and applications manager at Kemira.
“Board strength gains on modern packaging machines are not maximized simply by adding a strength agent. You need to understand the full process of proper chemical injection, wet-end charge balance, colloidal retention, on-line whitewater solids measurement, former drainage, press section water release, sheet consolidation and surface starch control to reach the best results. This is where Kemira’s over 100 years of chemistry expertise comes into play,” Michael concludes.
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